Criminologist and lawyer Juan Martens states that approximately one thousand aircraft land monthly on clandestine airstrips in Paraguay, primarily transporting cocaine. These flights are no longer limited to border zones, also operating in the Central region, which is bordered by the Paraguay River and full of ports from which the drug is redistributed.
The airstrips are strategically located near the river for quick loading onto the Paraguay-Paraná waterway, which Martens points to as the main route to Europe. Shipments destined for Brazil and Argentina travel by land.
Each aircraft carries on average between 300 and 400 kilograms of cocaine. Based on the volume of flights, Martens estimates that between 300,000 and 400,000 kilograms of the drug enter the country every month, highlighting the scale of the trafficking that uses Paraguay as a strategic corridor.
The expert attributes the operation of these routes to a lack of state personnel for effective controls and to bribes that facilitate transit through Paraguayan territory as a "bridge." He also observes that since 2021, there has been a shift of the organized crime structure to the capital, Asunción, where groups feel they can act with impunity due to the state's low capacity to respond.